


To see you

by marinstan



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Bad Ministry (I guess), Brief non-explicit mention of rape, Draco is hopelessly in love, Eventual Fluff, Fallen from grace Draco Malfoy, First Time, Friendship Pansy/Draco, Healing, Heavy Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Not Epilogue Compliant, Pining, Post War, disguises
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-02
Updated: 2020-07-02
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:27:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,888
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25035439
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/marinstan/pseuds/marinstan
Summary: I haven't seen you in five years and still, my hatred for you burns bright.That's a lie. But what of it? I'm a liar. Everyone knows that.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
Comments: 28
Kudos: 113





	To see you

**Author's Note:**

> This fic isn't SUPER dark, but it is pretty angsty. There is no graphic depiction of rape or violence, but overall, everything feels pretty dark and disturbing to me. I'm just giving you a heads-up, because I had trouble finding the appropriate tags to warn you, should you be sensitive.
> 
> Happy reading!

I haven't seen you in five years and still, my hatred for you burns bright.

That's a lie. But what of it? I'm a liar. Everyone knows that.

So you better not trust me. Once a liar, always a liar, or however that saying goes.

It's pretty tight in here – the flat I'm sharing with four others plus Pansy really is just meant for two people. Actually, it's meant for no people at all. The ants and cockroaches peacfully living here surely were offended when we suddenly barged in, all big, loud feet. Eating their scraps.

We've learned to share, the bugs and us. Afterall, it's not like we're any different.

They say – the papers, I mean, the Prophet (yes, it's still thriving, even after Rita Skeeter and everything) – that you know what it's like to sleep in tight places. Do you really?

It's hard to imagine. I've gotten so used to sleeping on the hard floor, I hardly remember what it was like in a real bed. But I still get claustrophobic. Sometimes. When there's too many bodies around me.

You slept alone, they say. In a cupboard. I bet there were ants sharing your space too. Maybe they know my ants. Maybe all ants are related, like all Death Eaters are. At least in the eyes of the Ministry.

They put us here, after the war. First they put us in Azkaban, of course. But then they felt kind of bad about wasting resources like that – plus someone apparently had a soft spot for scum and ants, because they made the public feel guilty for locking all of us up with Dementors.

So now, we're here. A merry neighbourhood just for us. A neighbourhood we can't leave, but I guess that's fine. There's nowhere to go for us, anyway.

Of course, we could have left the country. Maybe fled into the woods and lived a simple life.

But I never liked nature much.

You helped realizing the whole thing. This poor excuse for a ghetto. They said you thought it was a good idea.

I have a hard time believing that. It feels too half-arsed for you. Whatever you decide, you're always all in.

Burying a problem like this seems... not like you. I'm sure you'd have either wanted us all dead or reintegrated into society.

But we're neither. Some of us argue we're dead, of course, and what could I say to that? I am dead. Sort of.

Not dead enough not to feel hunger anymore. Not dead enough for the pains to stop that come from sleeping on stones and being cold all the time and doing hard manual labour all day.

So, as I said. We're neither. Not here, not there.

And it's your fault. I still don't get how you could've let it happen.

Aren't you too good for that?

I mean, no offense, but you've always been the good one, Harry. The strong one. You don't get to pussy out at the end of the road.

That's always been my job.

You could say now, why don't I end it myself? I could, afterall. You don't need a wand to kill yourself. Muggles do it all the time.

But, you see, I'm a coward. I know you know. I could never take a life. Not even my own.

Pansy hates you now. She never did in Hogwarts, even though I know you thought she did. But she didn't.

Now though... different story. You're basically the reason why she gets raped on a daily.

Perhaps I'm not being entirely fair. It's not _just_ your fault.

But it makes it easier for me to believe it is. I would really like to hate you.

They're all loud in their sleep. Little Finn always farts – absolutely disgusting. Jack has nightmares, which means he's always thrashing about. Kilian and Big Finn are rent boys, meaning they usually don't sleep much at night and when they tumble back into the flat, they're always high.

Pansy sleeps tucked into my side. She isn't actually allowed to be here. But after the last incident – meaning after the last time someone thought her a suitable outlet for his frustration, I insisted.

What do I care if they whip me or starve me or curse me for it? I'm in pain all the time anyway.

Also, I like having Pansy sleep with me. She's very warm.

Like you were. When you pulled me out of the fire. The whole world was in flames and my skin was melting, yet your body was warmer than any inferno could ever be.

That's just you. Always pushing boundaries.

Always setting fires.

We don't have a shower, so every morning, it's a huge ordeal – everyone fighting for a few minutes with the ratty sink, trying to wind their heads under the stream of water. I've gotten very good at it.

My hair is always clean. The rest of me... not so much. But my hair – impeccable. At least for ghetto standards.

Everyone always leaves for work at the same time, because we all do the same anyway. There are the ones working the mines – like Jack and Little Finn. There are the ones getting the more dangerous and illicit potions ingredients ready for purchase, like me or Pansy. And then there's the prostitutes of course.

I almost scored a spot among them. But then they didn't take me, because I forced a mushroom down my throat that gave me the worst kinds of sores. Everyone believed me when I told them it was an STD.

Smart, eh? You should be proud of me. Blonds are always in demand. Even boys.

The upside of being a hooker is that they actually get out of here from time to time, to get fucked on backseats and in rundown hotels and on expensive carpets. If they're really good, they sometimes stay away the whole night.

But most are not that good and they're probably not getting fed or clothed anyway, so I decided it wouldn't be worth it.

I'd rather die a virgin than have my arse be pounded by one of those people that disgust me – one of the people that put me here.

I deserved it, you say? But I don't think I did. Not really.

I mean, think about it. Five years in hell. Only two years of me working for the Dark Lord. And I didn't even really want to, but if you say now that's not the point, I'm inclined to agree with you.

Even if you say  _I_ still deserve this, what about Pansy? She never raised her wand against any of you heros. Yet she now needs my arms to fall asleep.

I know you love justice, Harry. Tell me – how is this just?

We get a new inhabitant after a long day of work. That's not unusual. People die young around here, so gradually, flats grow empty. They don't allow loners to keep their flat. They prefer to push them around, squeeze them into one of the too small rooms already claimed by at least three others.

With Pansy, we're seven now. Which is why I can't really stand Henry, but whatever. One more guy sighing at night. I'll get over it.

Pansy and I make dinner. It always comes from cans and it has no taste, but no one ever complains. I make sure I leave some scraps for the ants. It's not their fault everyone is suddenly eating even the mouldy bits.

The new kid – brown eyes rimmed with deep, deep circles – apparently works with me now. I'm starting to wonder if maybe, he's one of the ones that maybe managed to escape after the war. Those exist, even though they're not many.

I don't ask him. It's none of my business, and, frankly, I couldn't care less.

While I'm burning my fingers on skinned redworms, I think of you.

I hate myself for it, but I developed this habit when I was eleven years old and it's probably the only thing that hasn't changed since the war.

I'm always thinking of you. Even when there were other things to think of. Now, there aren't, so I'm thinking of you even more.

I wonder if you're laughing when you think of us, of me, burning my fingers on redworms. I wonder if it gives you satisfaction, knowing that you managed to turn the tables.

Somehow, I don't think you are.

What I really believe... is that you don't think of me at all. Of us scum.

Why should you? You did your job. You got your happy ending.

We are just collateral damage in your quest of building a new, a  _better_ wizarding Britain.

You're not even really wrong. I know that everyone who's not us, is happier now.

And who cares about a couple thousand bodies in the grand scheme of things? I certainly never have.

Henry is accidentally cutting off half of his finger. I guess I better help him.

Okay, back to my rambling (Henry's fine, don't worry – I'm very good at first aid): This is what I don't understand.  


You got it all. I get that showing your face on the streets must have been exhausting, but  _you got it all_ , didn't you, Harry? 

So why would you run away?

I think the Ministry (and your friends, I guess) tried to keep it from the public, but the Prophet always finds out.

We were all waiting around for Big Finn to finally vacate the sink (he always tries to scrub his whole body. It's impossible to get it through to him that really no one wants to see his scrawny arse), when Jack gasped.   


There it was, on the frontpage.

You were gone. Just like that. Poof – Saviour down. 

They assume you went on your own two feet, that you wanted to leave, but I'm not so sure.

I know you'd say I don't know you, but believe me, I do. I've spent so much time watching you, you really have no idea.

And I, self-proclaimed expert in all things you, think you wouldn't  _run_ . It's just not what you do.

You're way too brave for that.

Yet you've been missing for a week now and if anyone has any idea where you are, they keep it out of the papers.

Pansy says she hopes your dead. I say I wish for you to be eaten by maggots.   
I'm lying, obviously. I don't want you dead. Never have.

You could know that, if you had paid just a little bit attention to me. But I don't think you really have.

It's astonishing how nothing really changed since you're gone. You'd think the Ministry would need you. They always drag you into everything, afterall. But it seems like they're doing just fine.

The only difference is that we now get those updates every other day that no one knows anything. There are probably also some crazy fans looking for you, but not here. Where I live, you have no friends.

You did, before. Before we were put here. Many of the people I eat and sleep and shit next to adored you, thanked you,  _worshipped_ you for taking down The Dark Lord.

Until they were taken down by you, too. You and all your friends and allies and what not.

But, well. I suppose you can't save everyone.

Even though you had it in you to save me, hell knows why. 

Because you're not a killer, some would say. But I think differently. I think you are one. You can be. You're harder than I am. You used to be anyway.

Now I'm basically a cockroach, so I guess that makes me the harder one afterall. Who's laughing now, huh, Potter?

I'm just kidding. I think. My thoughts tend to run a bit wild, lately. I don't talk enough.

But Pansy is the only person I really like talking to and even she's getting on my nerves lately. She's turned into such a dark cynic that I have to play the optimist to balance her out.

It's exhausting.

Henry and Jack are playing chess with rice. It's difficult, because you have to remember which grain of rice is what kind of piece, but they figure it out.

Jack wins, as always. Except when Blaise plays. But Blaise hardly ever comes around anymore since he lost a foot in the mines. I think he's depressed.

I'd come over and cheer him up if I knew how. But I don't and I don't feel like trying.

Trying never gets me anywhere.

Granger was against the ghetto system. Of course she was. But no one listened to her.

Not even you. I guess you do think you're always right, don't you? 

But you're not. I know you're not, because you ran right into the Dark Lord's trap one time. My father went to Azkaban because of you.

That was a time that I really hated you, even though I knew I didn't  _really_ have the right to. I know he probably tried to kill your friends.

But still. You shouldn't have been so stupid, you know? You almost got yourself caught.

I'd have told you that, had you asked me. I could have helped you.

If I hadn't been on the wrong side, of course. But in theory. 

I'm not as impulsive as you are. Not that it helped me with anything, but it's a good quality to have.

In theory.

After the war, I was reeling. Obviously. We all were. Even you, I believe.

I saw you in Azkaban. You were only passing through, of course. I'm not really sure what you were doing. Maybe you took inventar or something like that. Maybe you were picking a whore.

Don't look at me like that! Many people were. That's how we lost Astoria.

Anyway, you walked by my cell – and paused. You stood there with your stupid green eyes and looked at me.  _Really_ looked at me. And I looked right back.

You were so beautiful. I know most people wouldn't think so, but screw those people

You're beautiful. 

I still hate you, Harry. Trying to. I swear.

It doesn't matter anyway. You ran and if you weren't indifferent before, now you definitely are.

Except – except if you didn't run. What if – someone hurt you?

I know, I know. It's ridiculous. Who could hurt you?

Dumbledore is dead. So is the Dark Lord. There isn't anyone left to hurt you that way.

And still, I worry.

Because I'm hopeless, Pansy says.

Ten days after you disappeared, I get back from work and Pansy and Henry are waiting for me in front of the flat.

Jack and Kilian are fucking, says Pansy. I sigh.

I really wish they could do it on the street like everyone else. But, no. Apparently, they're  _in love_ and need to do it on our mattress. Our  _only_ mattress.

It's so thin that it's not much better than the floor, but it  _is_ better than the floor.

I say that I'll kill them for getting spunk on the mattress. Pansy only laughs at me and Henry seems a little confused.

I don't mean it, I tell him because he's new and apparently doesn't really understand how the world works yet.

Because none of us is interested in watching the two blokes getting it on, we roam the streets until we all agree that they  _must_ be done by now.

Before, when Pansy and I took strolls like this, it was usually in Hogwarts, skirting the forest or the lake, sitting in the grass, smelling the trees.

I don't even remember how trees smell anymore. Seriously.

But I never cared for nature anyway, so it's fine.

We talked about you a lot during those walks. I was pretty obsessed with you, to be honest.

I still am. But that's only because there is nothing pretty in my life anymore and... well, I remember you best. Everything else is kind of blurry to me.

The first time I saw you, I knew I liked you. Don't ask me why.

It can't have been your baggy clothes or your scrawny arse. It can't have been your shaggy head of hair, the broken glasses. Nothing about you is really that appealing. Just everything, I guess.

In Madam Malkin's, for a few precious minutes, you were just a boy with bony wrists and pretty eyes and I was just a boy wanting to get to know you.

Then, of course, I realized  _who_ you really were. It made me want to  _have_ you. To take you and slip you into my pocket and keep you there. Maybe parade you around a little and then lock you in my room, keep you all to myself.

I was a troubled child.

The longer I went to school with you, the less I liked you. The less I liked you, the more I wanted you.

How preposterous, the though of you and I. It's pornographic, every time I imagine it. Your tan skin against my white, your black hair, my silver strands, your green, my gray. I got off on picturing us together.

I know, I know. Narcissistic much?

But you can't deny I used to be handsome. I was.

And I didn't get off on the thought of  _me,_ but of  _us._ I wanted you to touch me so bad, it drove me up the walls.

I dreamt of you kissing me a couple times and every single time, I was blissed out in my dream. Then woke up devastated and angry and breathless.

You're thinking now I just wanted to fuck you. 

But that was never it, sadly. I did want to fuck, obviously. I mean, I was a teenager and horny all the time. And you were sex.

At the same time, you were a lot more than that.

I adored you, Harry.

There you have it. It's out.  


Maybe you know already, I don't really care. I know I haven't been subtle.

To be perfectly honest: I adore you. Still.

Even though you hurt me and Pansy. Shame on you for that.

But I know you were only capable of that because you didn't  _see_ . You weren't here. If you had seen her bleeding like I have, you would have helped her. I'm sure of that.

Because you are a good person. I've always been such a slut for that. I wanted you to purge me with your light.

You've been gone for two weeks and the Prophet is writing obituaries for you like you were dead.

Pansy is thrilled. I'm not.

But I'm an ant, so I try to just keep going.

I'm scrubbing the sink, trying to get it halfway clean, when Henry walks in. He wants to know why I'm inside when the sun is shining and all the other ants are out, trying to catch some rays. I want to tell him to go fuck himself.

I never really do what I want anymore, so I just say that I really want to get this sink clean.

When he asks to help me, I almost give in and tell him that I also really,  _really_ want to be alone. Please, just give me a couple sacred minutes to think of you. All alone, just you and me.

But Henry is oblivious and can't take a hint.

While he's helping me scrub, I notice that his hair is awfully greasy and dirty. Really, awful. As if he hadn't washed it in a week.

I tell him so.

He flinches. His hands remind me of yours.

I suppress the thought quickly. Killian's laugh had once sounded so much like yours (to my ears at least), that I actually called for you.

Since then, they all think I'm a bit insane.

He never really has time to wash it, Henry confesses.

I ask him why he doesn't do it when everyone else does it. We have an order.

He's not in it, he says. Because he's new.

When I think about it, I realize he's right. No one cut their time shorter to squeeze him in and he never asked.

I tell him he has to. If he doesn't ask for things here, he'll never get anything. He'll starve in a corner.

Then I wash his hair. It's much brighter afterward. 

Annoyingly, Henry takes that as an encouragement to follow me around all the time. Almost like you did, just... worse.   
I get it – many people in this place don't like to be alone. But I'm already taken. I have Pansy to care for and be cared for by. He'll have to find someone else, sorry.

But he doesn't. He just sticks to me like our ants to the flat and keeps stepping on my heels. He tells me he likes my hair.   
I tell him that we won't shag. He blushes and says that's okay.

I never shag anyone. I think if you walked into this place a virgin, you should probably stay one. Without wands and condoms and mentally stable people, it just isn't worth it.

I wonder who you lost your virginity to. Probably Weasley. The female one, I mean. I don't know if you even like boys. Even though the number of male whores we have suggests that there are more men than one would think who fancy a little arse-fuck now and then.

Not to say that's all there is to being gay. I'm sure straights like it too, from time to time. And not all gays do and so on.

What I really want to know is what  _you_ like. In bed and outside of it.

Even with all the effort I made in watching you, there are not many things I know that you really  _like_ . You like Qudditch. You like Weasley and Granger and you like treacle tart.

That's about it. 

You never really seemed to spend much time on doing the things you like.

It's really, really embarrassing how often I dreamt of sucking you off, just so you could relax a little.

Maybe you ran off with someone who does that for you. Maybe you found someone who showed you what life can be like, what luxury means.

I hope you did and I hate that it isn't me.

But since it was never going to be anyway, that would still be good. A good reason for you to leave.

I bet you wonder how I can say such things about you when it was you who put me here, essentially. 

You see, Harry – I can't hate you for that. I can't really hate anyone for hurting me.

It's not like I was an angel. I wasn't even halfway decent. 

I was the worst. I almost killed your friend. 

I deserved to get punished. Not for life, perhaps, but it would've been wrong to just let me off the hook.

The good thing about being in this place really is that I don't feel so guilty anymore. I have bled and hungered and thirsted and desired and hurt so much in this place, it's hard to feel like I'd deserve even more.

It's nice not to feel like the bad guy anymore.

Even though I  _do_ hate you a little for Pansy. But I've said that before.

When Granger and Weasley knock on our door, I think I'm hallucinating.

No one from the outside ever comes here. No one. And certainly not your best friends.

I'm just gaping at them. 

I hate to say it, but Granger looks really nice with her mane still wild, but silky now. She's learned how to dress herself.

Weasley... ugh, I hate to say this even  _more_ , but he looks decent, too. Not quite as scrawny anymore, better posture.

They both smell so good, I almost pass out. I forgot what a difference it makes when you have a shower.

I think they're pretty shocked, judging by the way they're staring at me. Pansy and Kilian are coming up next to me. The rest of them is out.

Weasley says my name, asks, as if he isn't quite sure it really is me.

I say,  _yes_ , and  _hello_ , and try to remember how to talk to real people, people that aren't ants.

It's only when they ask if they could come in that I start to get angry. That I  _remember_ to get angry.

They're not you. I don't adore them, so I can hate them. Hate them for all this.

Even though, I know, Granger never wanted it.

Weasley did though. I never liked him. I think he's married to some Hufflepuff girl now. Perhaps she makes him feel like a man.

Little does he know none of them are real men. You're not one if you've never seen people shit and cry and bleed and laugh and fuck and get dirty like I have. Like  _we_ have.

They made us into something stronger.

Cockroaches and ants.

Weasley is still just a boy.

They look around in the flat and I can tell they're horrified. It must smell disgusting to them.

Pansy is clinging to my hand and Kilian flees.

Granger looks at me, face free of makeup, but she smells expensive. Her clothes probably cost as much as mine used to cost when I was still a boy.

She says that what she's about to ask me will sound weird. But – but have I seen you?

_Have I seen you?_ What the hell is she thinking?

You might have run, I don't know, but you wouldn't run to this place of all places.

I tell them no. 

They exchange a look. Then they ask me about new people around here, ask me how many there are of us, if anything seemed off lately.

Pansy and I are lost, but we try our best to answer their questions satisfactory. Who knows what the consequences might be if we don't.

They nod and take notes and frown and breathe through their mouths. And then they leave.

In the doorframe, Granger turns around again. There is no ring on her finger, just manicured nails.

She says she's sorry.   


We say nothing.

So they're looking for you. It seems like they think one of us might have kidnapped you or hurt you or whatever, but that is ludicrous. We didn't manage to when we were still proper witches and wizards. However would we now?

You're  _you_ and we're ants. Wandless ants.

We tell the others when they get back and Big Fin almost starts puking out of fear. Jack is optimistic though. He thinks it's a good thing Granger was here.

He actually believes maybe she'll try to change something.

Funny how some of us still have optimism left. I resist the urge to tear him down. I could, easily, but what would I gain? Good for him if he can see light in all of this grime.

Henry says nothing much. Pansy tells him that we told them about him, since they were asking for new people around here. He just nods. Says  _alright_ .

At night, I'm woken up by hands on my shoulders. I'm prepared to fight when I see it's just Henry.

I glare at him but when he motions for me to follow him out of the flat for the third time, I go with him, careful not to wake Pansy.

In the dark, dirty hallway, I tell him again that we won't fuck, He just nods impatiently. Then he draws in a breath. He has to tell me something. I shouldn't freak out.

I try to estimate if I could take him down in a fight. I don't know. We're about the same height and weight, he is a little thicker, but it doesn't seem significant.

I cross my arms and he starts talking. 

He's crazy, apparently. He believes he's you.

I tell it to him bluntly. He sighs. Then he closes his eyes and his face changes.

I stagger back.

I was wrong. It's not him who's crazy.

It's me. It's me it's me it's me, because... it can't be. He's you.

I blink and gasp and feel like throwing up and like lunging at you, like throttling you, like kissing you. Like falling off the surface of earth and vanish forever.

You take a step forward. My ears are ringing.

I tell you that this isn't real. But you shake your head. You say it is.

He's been you all along. He's been you and I didn't see it.

As always, I've been too busy dreaming of you to realize what was right in front of my nose.

I tell you that I don't understand. Shaking.

You talk fast, but take a lot of pauses. You say you're sorry. Even on your own face, the dark circles are still there. 

You explain to me that you haven't really made any decision on your own since the war. You say you felt like you were going crazy because you were a puppet on a string.

I don't have any thoughts. I have too many thoughts.

You, green eyes so bright in the moonlight, say that you needed to get away.

And you needed things to change. Granger was right (you call her Hermione, of course, but her and I don't have that kind of relationship). This whole thing was wrong and you were about to change it.

As long as the Minister insisted on keeping the ghettos, you'd be here.

I swallow and then I tell you that it doesn't seem like your plan is going to work. They pretend you're dead.

You frown. Apparently, you think that things will change now. Because Granger and Weasley know now.

I can't help but ask why you didn't just tell them in the first place.

They wouldn't have understood. They wouldn't have _let_ you, you say.

After that, we're both quiet. I'm still not fully convinced you're really here. I dream of you so often – maybe that's all this is.

I study your face. It's as dirty as mine.

The way you're looking at me right now... I think you were feeling guilty.

There would have been other ways to convince the Minister, other ways to protest. But you wanted to punish yourself.

I tell you that you shouldn't. That you should leave this place.

But you're stubborn.

You simply shake your head and stay.

In front of the others, you're still wearing your disguise, but whenever we're alone, you drop it. You're so good with wandless magic, you don't even _need_ your wand. It's really crazy. You're crazy.

We live in the same flat, eat the same food, wash ourselves in the same sink. We even work together.

Now that I know it's you, I can't keep my eyes off Henry. I can't believe I didn't notice the way he moves. Like you. Exactly like you.

Despite everything, I obviously still don't expect you to like me. Not until you kiss me behind our horrid house, with your own lips, not Henry's.

Kissing you is like breathing. It's like food and water and fresh clothes. It's everything good.

We always kiss now when we're alone.

One time, I make myself ask you how you can do that. Put your mouth on mine, when you used to hate me. When I used to hurt you.

You say that we're different people now. And you never really hated me anyway.

Then you kiss me again and I don't care about anything else.

The day before Granger and Weasley get the new laws passed, you pull me into one of the small alleys. People might hear us here, but at least no one can see.

I know what you want, even before you ask me if what I said to Henry applies to you, too.

Of course it doesn't. You're always the exception.

I push my pants down for you and you push yours down for me and then I tell you I'm scared of STD's – I don't want to be the reason you die or that I die and I don't want to be shitting blood – and you say that you'll cast protection spells and then I break down a little because I'm sure you have fucked countless times before and I never have.

Your eyes widen a little and then you tell me you've never been with another boy, either, you haven't been with girls, really – just one. Just one girl. That's it.

When I touch you, you moan. It's my new favourite sound. I didn't know it before.

We're not teenagers anymore, but our hands still make quick work and I'm surprised and in awe when I watch you spilling over my fingers. It makes me come too, and then we kiss and you spell us clean, or at least cleaner. You close my pants for me and I kiss you again.

All in all, it takes the Ministry a month to vacate the ghetto.

A month in which Pansy and I move in with you. You and a shower and a kitchen and soft beds.

Pansy doesn't talk to you and for a day, she isn't talking to me, either. Because she knows now. That you're Henry and that I've had sex with you.

But Pansy doesn't have anyone but me and we love each other, so she comes around pretty quickly.

It's going to take me a minute or two or a million to get used to this. I was a spoiled brat and then I was a haughty, terrified teenager and then an ant. And now... I don't know who I am.

Whenever I tell you that, you say I'm Draco Malfoy, the man of your dreams. I inform you that that's not _who_ I _am_.

You get it, but say I shouldn't put so much pressure on myself. I'll figure out.   
I'll figure it out, just like we figure out a way for Pansy to afford a small flat of her own. Like we figure out how I'm going to be able to get a job.

I sleep in your bed and when you have nightmares, I hold you and kiss your hair. When I can't fall asleep at night, I sneak out of your bed and into Pansy's.

Eventually, we fuck, even though it's more like... you know, _making love_ , however horrid that sounds. We're a bit awkward about the whole thing, but in the end, pushing inside you is heaven. When you fuck me afterward, you lock our fingers and I die for you. I always have.

You kiss my collar bone and I run my hands down your back and think of all the years without you. The grimy and dirty and humbling and awful years that I didn't deserve, but that made me a better person anyway. And a traumatized one, too.

One day, I'll tell you that I only made it out alive because of you. Because I kept you inside me, safe and warm.

Maybe then, you'll feel a little less guilty. Maybe you'll be able to take a full breath again, without the walls caving in.

If not, that's fine too.

I'll gladly breathe for you.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and Kudos are very, very appreciated!


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